Dig Deeper:

Dig Deeper:

How Hot Is Your (Compost) Heap?

Keep your compost temperature in check.

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Q. What is the point of taking a compost pile’s temperature? What temperature should it be?

Cathy Munoz
Naperville, Illinois

A. When ingredients going into the compost pile include diseased or pest-infested plant matter and/or weed seeds, hot composting offers a way to deal with those problem organisms so they don’t return to your garden in the finished compost. Frequent aeration—achieved by turning the pile—and temperature monitoring are necessary to ensure that hot, or thermal, composting controls bad actors like weeds and diseases without producing so much heat that the compost bursts into flame.

Elaine Ingham, Ph.D., chief scientist at the Rodale Institute, compares a thermal compost pile to a lively party scene: “Just think about any crowded bar, with people dancing, partying, and getting rowdy, and think of the heat that can be generated in a place like that,” Ingham says. That’s what happens in a compost pile where nitrogen-containing foods such as legumes, seed meals, and manures get the party started by boosting the activity of the decomposers in the pile. As bacteria and fungi grow and reproduce rapidly under the influence of high-nitrogen organic materials, heat is released.

To generate the heat needed to thoroughly process problem ingredients, Ingham notes, the party in your compost pile has to go for 10 to 15 days. This takes quite a bit of food, and the pile needs to be turned at least five times during those 2 weeks to get oxygen back into the pile and to cool things off a bit. “Also, the pile needs to be evened out, so the really hot spots get mixed with the ‘wallflowers,’” she continues.

After a compost pile is constructed, rising temperatures within the pile indicate that microbes have begun to break down the organic materials. Regular temperature monitoring lets you make sure the decomposers are at work long enough to kill diseases, pests, parasites, weed seeds, and pest nematodes. While experienced compost chefs may be able to judge their pile’s temperature by feel, a 20-inch compost thermometer is a worthwhile investment of about $30 to provide a more reliable measurement of temperatures within a heap. Composting fanatics might opt to splurge on a thermometer with a 3-foot probe, costing $120 or more and able to take readings from deeper within a pile. Using the thermometer’s long probe, monitor the compost daily during the first week to 10 days to see if the interior of the pile remains in the desirable range of 140°F to 160°F.